


Mirror Mirror

by MissSpock



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Season 3, Unhealthy Relationships, lots of guilt, post their marriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-12
Updated: 2015-09-12
Packaged: 2018-04-20 09:45:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4782848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissSpock/pseuds/MissSpock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The mirror told Belle a lot of things. She doesn't believe them. She should.</p>
<p>(short one shot about what was going on beneath the surface during Season 3 of Rumbelle's "happy" marriage)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mirror Mirror

Neither of them notice anything, but they've grown accustomed to watching.

He gauges her every reaction. Watches her from beneath his eyelashes. Carefully asks questions that seem to mean nothing. He is too gentle with her. Too indulgent. He caters to her pettiest desires. But nothing being a newly married man can't explain away.

She is less bold. Sometimes she'll watch him when she thinks he's not looking. Always her eyes stray to the healing scar on the side of his jaw, and her fingers tremble at the memory of what she'd almost done. But when he turns around, she's ready with a smile.

Dinner is more awkward than their first days at the Dark Castle. He pulls out her chair and asks about her day. She tells him about the library and asks about the shop. What used to be natural seems forced and hollow. Some nights his eyes are dark and distant and she's almost glad when she gathers up the plates, turns with a tight smile and disappears into the kitchen to wash up.

On those nights he tells her he's going to check on the shop and walks away without another word.

He is closed off from her, and she thinks it's her fault.

She doesn't know what to do. It's the first time she's lied to him. It's the first time she's grasped a weapon with the sole intent of hurting. She didn't even know she was capable of such a thing. 

She didn't seem like the girl she knew. And certainly not the one he loves. 

And although she's apologized, so many times, so profusely, in every way she knew how, all he's said was that it's fine, that she'd been enchanted and "that, dearie, can take a lot out of anyone." She doesn't like it when he calls her "dearie," as if holding her at arm's length, and the something in his voice, the way he looks at her betrays him. 

He'd held her at arm's length before. When she was a different woman with a different name. She remembers that time differently than all of her other memories. She remembers the taste of darkness, how carefully he used to look at her. The same carefulness that flits into his guarded face now. 

She wishes she doesn't know him the way she did.

He's too much of a coward to lie to her face more than once, and every time she apologizes he steers her away from the topic, uneasy. He doesn't want to hear about the mirror's all-too-true lies. Changes the subject as soon as he can and hides behind irrelevant words. He thinks she's caught on, and wants to leave her with no reason for doubt. But treading carefully leaves him nothing of value to say. He finds himself holding his breath when they are in the same room, the steady beat of she knows she knows she knows drumming in his chest making it impossible to breathe. They're waiting, gasping for air at the edge of the plunge, he knows.

And he wishes it would stop.

When he proposed to her he prayed to god that she wouldn't say "yes."

He prayed to god that she would see through him when her fingers wrapped around the fake dagger, that she would know there wasn't ever a way for her to change him, that he is a villain, and not because he has to be, but because he wants to be, and that as long as that desire festers in him and gnaws at him from the inside he couldn't ever be her true love because he may say otherwise but if there comes a day to make a choice between her and what he wants he would pick his desire every time. And he knows she deserves true love in its purest form, knows that he couldn't give that to her and yet when she threw her arms around him he knew he couldn't have ever let her go. 

And later, when they join hands for the first time as husband and wife, he tells himself she must have known. True love's kiss can break any curse, and he is still the Dark One. She had seen how he couldn't change, not even for his own son, so what makes her think he'd change for her?

He couldn't change for her. And she would never change because of him. That's what he loves most about her, her the resilience in her incredible faith. He's pushed her away countless times, broken her heart, watched her forget he ever existed, took advantage of her trust and yet she always comes back to him because she believes him to be capable of the one thing he does not believe he possesses. 

He wishes he could have the courage to tell her that she can't be the antidote. Not this time. Not for him. 

She wishes and he wishes, and both of them try though neither of them notice anything. But they've grown accustomed to watching.

He pours her a drink.

She smiles without looking up.

A quiet toast, and then, she lifts her head and he lifts his.

And dark eyes meet bright blue ones.

They watch. And they wait.


End file.
